Ancient Byzantine Church Discovered In Tiberias

Impressive Byzantine church discovered
in excavations in Tiberias

In excavations carried
out by the Israel Antiquities Authority in Tiberias
impressive and unique finds were uncovered that shed light
on the history of the ancient city.

Byzantine mosaics
date from the founding of Tiberias in the first century
CE

The excavations were
conducted over the course of the last three months at the
request of Mekorot, as part of a project that involves the
installation of a sewage pipeline and the transfer of the
waste water treatment facility from Tiberias to the southern
part of the Sea of Galilee.

The finds that were exposed
date from the founding of Tiberias in the first century CE
until the eleventh century, when the city was abandoned due
to an earthquake, wars and dire economic and security
conditions. In the lower part of the city, a Byzantine
church (from the fourth-fifth centuries CE) was exposed that
is paved with magnificent polychrome mosaics decorated with
geometric patterns and crosses.

Three dedicatory
inscriptions written in ancient Greek are incorporated in
the mosaics. In one of the inscriptions, which were
deciphered by Dr. Leah Di Signi of the Hebrew University of
Jerusalem, is the line: "Our Lord, protect the soul of your
servant..." [Our Lord=Jesus]

One of the mosaics is
adorned with a medallion in which there is a large cross
flanked by the letters alpha and omega, which are one of the
monograms for Jesus (alpha to omega meaning from A to Z in
Greek).

The church's remains were discovered adjacent to
ancient public buildings among them a basilica, bathhouse,
streets and shops that were exposed at the site in the past.
Dr. Moshe Hartal and Edna Amos, the directors of the
excavation on behalf of the Antiquities Authority, stated
that this is the most ancient church to be uncovered in
Tiberias and the only one that has been found in the center
of the city.

According to Dr. Hartal, from the year 427
CE the Church issued a decree prohibiting the placement of
crosses in mosaic floors in order to prevent them from being
stepped on. "The presence of so many crosses in the floors
of the church that was exposed here thus confirms the church
dates to the period prior to the ban," he said.

In
addition, the remains of a Jewish neighborhood that dates to
the tenth-eleventh centuries were discovered in the
excavations. These remains extend up to the foot of the
cliff in the high part of the city, in an area that was
probably residential in nature.

"The discovery of the
remains of the church in the middle of the ancient city,
like that of the Jewish neighborhood and the magnificent
city that existed in Tiberias more than one thousand years
ago, greatly contributes to our understanding of the town
planning, its scope and it structures," archaeologists on
behalf of the Antiquities Authority said.

The discovery
of the church in the heart of the Jewish quarter disproves
the theory that the Jews prevented the Christians from
establishing prayer halls in the middle of the city," they
added.

In the Holiday Inn hotel's parking lot, in the
southern part of the excavation, buildings were uncovered
that were replete with a wealth of impressive ceramic
vessels that date to the Early Islamic period (8th-11th
centuries CE) and installations for the manufacture of glass
and pottery vessels.

These finds show that in this period
the settlement of Hammat was included within the domain of
the city of Tiberias, which had grown and expanded beyond
the Byzantine city walls that had previously separated it
from Hammat.

In addition a settlement was discovered that
dates to the Early Bronze Age (from 5,000 years ago) thereby
attesting to the fact that the region of Tiberias was
inhabited in periods earlier than those mentioned in the
historical sources.

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